Fake degree certificate racket busted; five held

Visakhapatnam: City police on Monday busted a fake degree certificate racket and arrested five `directors` of private colleges and institutes in this connection.

Several fake rubber stamps of various universities, a laptop, a computer and other materials were seized from the possession of the accused, a senior police officer said.

"We recovered a total of 580 fake educational certificates of SSC, diploma and degree courses run by 22 universities, open schools and other institutes in the country from the accused", Police Commissioner Sivadhar Reddy told reporters today.

The accused are identified as Kudupuri Srinivas, Mamidi Murali Krishna, Molli Appana Yadav, Pithani Bhanu and Kasa Narengra Yadav who claimed to be directors of local private institutes and colleges, he said.

The mastermind of the racket, K Srinivas Yadav alias Srinivasa Rao and Dudi Jagadeesh, director of Vignan Sai College are absconding, Reddy added.

According to police, K Srinivas Yadav had been printing fake certificates and supplying them to his agents in Visakhapatnam for past two years, who in turn would sell them for anywhere between Rs 10,000 to Rs 2 lakh.

"The gang was exposed after some victims claimed that they were duped by the accused who took money from them for issuing Andhra University certificates but failed to deliver", the police commissioner said.

Following the complaint, the police sent its personnel as decoy customers to the accused and trapped them.

According to police, K Srinivas Yadav was operating the racket from Hyderabad while his cousin Kasa Narengra Yadav opened a front under the name of Rishi Technologies.